


Decode

by eyemeohmy



Category: Tron - All Media Types, Tron: Betrayal, Tron: Evolution
Genre: Alternate Reality, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, General spoilers, Mild Profanity, Mild to Moderate Violence, Romance, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-31
Updated: 2012-12-31
Packaged: 2017-11-23 02:40:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/617192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eyemeohmy/pseuds/eyemeohmy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She's not an ISO. She's Ophelia.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Decode

**Author's Note:**

> Just something I wrote a while back. The style I've used for this isn't my regular style, as anyone who's read more of my stuff will notice. It was something I just whipped up at the time and rolled with. So it may be a bit confusing/disjointed.
> 
> Ophelia is a minor-ish but still important character from the Betrayal comics. This canon assumes Ophelia and Radia are two separate entities. I put major character death juuuuust in case.

For all intents and purposes, she looks like a Basic. Ophelia's skin is soft, nearly translucent; it glows like the circuits across her suit, those beneath her eyes, and along her chin. Pure energy, white and blue tinted. Her hair is black, the length at her shoulders; wet, flat against her head, strung like tendrils around her long, thin throat. Dried, they seem to fan out, shaping her face, making her look as young as her age but still with black eyes that reflect a maturity of a man who has seen decades worth of history. Her body is petite, lean, and she sits polite and pretty in the chair, one ankle folded over the other, hands with naturally manicured nails resting on her thigh; she smiles, genuine, as Kevin floods her with millions of questions.

Clu chooses to watch. He has questions, too, but he's not sure what they are. If he can even ask them. Right now, his User has her attention and it is his place not to interrupt. But when Kevin announces he must leave, he speaks briefly to his system administrator. He answers a few unasked inquiries, and Clu can see he's not alone in his suspicion. Kevin sounds wary, almost, nervous, as if the woman now being offered a robe by a siren just downstairs is something more than a miracle.

Something dangerous.

It is short lived, of course. Kevin lets go of his suspicion soon enough. But for that moment in time, they, Clu and Kevin, are one. He leaves and orders Clu and Tron to keep an eye on this Isomorphic Algorithm.

"I felt as if I were being dissected."

Clu looks up from his datapad. Ophelia is standing beside him in the conference room. She's gracefully tall, but a foot short of him, and she wears the robes as if they were water around her. She is staring outside, down below where a city is being built, and her black eyes are reflections, pools of white and blue. He wants to ask her where Tron is, why he would let her out of his sight. But instead, he chooses to watch.

"You're not like your User."

Clu blinks, unsure how to take her words. Ophelia smiles and looks at him. He's momentarily confused as to how well the circuits on her face bring out the natural glow of her skin.

"He's talkative," she explains, hands swept behind her back, "you... you prefer to observe."

"Both have their advantages," he replies, sounding neutral. He closes the datapad and turns to face her completely. "Why have you come here?"

"I wanted to meet you."

Clu feels uneasy. He's not sure how to respond to her smile. It's for him, him alone. And he's had many smiles given to him, all as equally kind and friendly, but her's... It's different; not in the way of how she is, but in a way where it's a smile like anyone else's, but unique all its own. He's not sure what he's trying to say, so he ignores it.

"Tron should be taking you for a view around the city, correct?"

Ophelia nods. "I'm excited," she says. Her coal eyes brighten with color all her own. "Will you join us?"

"I've work."

Ophelia frowns, and Clu doesn't know why he doesn't like that, even if it's only a frown. For a moment, they are silent, standing only a few feet apart. She turns to go, her eyes catching the Basic's for a moment. She says something in that gaze and the way her body moves that Clu answers with his own: "Why is your designation Ophelia?"

It's strange and awkward. Of all the things he could ask, wanted to ask, he chose to inquire about her name. It almost puts him to shame. But the shames lies in the fact that he wants the answer to this question above all others. Clu wanted to know about ISOs in general, but to be so specific...

"It comes from the writings of a User," Ophelia answers. "As I configured into what I am now in the sea, information passed through me like a network of dozens of personalities and intelligence, knowledge and wisdom. And in this sea within a sea, I heard a story, a story with a girl who went mad with grief and derezzed herself - drowned, they say - in a lake. There were pictures, many depicting the scene of her demise - all beautiful, all tragic." She looks down, brushes a lock of black hair behind her ear. "It sounds depressing, I know. And yet, when I rose from the sea, I wondered if I was experiencing some sort of malfunction. A dream, Users would say. Instead of drowning my madness, I swam from the water to embrace it." She smiles, quaint despite her morbid story. "To you, I really must be insane."

Clu doesn't know what he thinks. There's some sort of madness afoot if something like her can crawl out the sea; she has no User, she was not written, but she appears just as he does, she speaks and blinks and smiles and admires and considers just as he does. It makes him slightly disconcerted.

"Kevin did not ask me why I named myself Ophelia," she chuckles. "I figured you would repeat the same questions."

"He provided me with the answers."

Ophelia's eyes soften. "Then perhaps you read his comment? About 'evolution'?"

Clu had. _In evolution, the first man - or User - came crawling out from the water. Not as we are now. Much, much different. Ophelia's case - it's almost like evolution. She's a new breed of life. One that may be superior._

Superior feels insulting but he can't find the means to be offended when she's smiling at him. "He made me seem like a miracle," Ophelia says, "when all I feel like is a little girl who fell down the rabbit hole and ended up in Wonderland."

"I'm afraid I don't understand your references."

Ophelia giggles. "I'm sorry."

References, similes, metaphors - Kevin was always using them. But in that instant, Clu thought of an old one he heard many cycles ago. 'Warm like the sun'. If he knew the warmth and depth of this star, it'd have to be something close to the way he feels when she laughs. He's not sure what this is, perhaps an error in his coding, but then Tron is here and Ophelia excuses herself but not without saying, "I hope we can talk more in the future."

Clu would like that. But for reasons all scientific, for research alone. Nothing personal.

Something like that.

\----

It's a task assigned of him, but he doesn't feel like it's an obligation.

The waves of the black sea rock against the shore, inhaling, exhaling, in beats soft and steady and predictable without losing its edge. Ophelia, she's a lot like the sea. She talks, walks, acts like a Basic, nothing out of the ordinary, but inside Clu knows she's something not of this world. Something that doesn't belong, but manages to live among society like one of its own.

Ophelia's feet are bare as she walks along the shore, kicking up sand. Clu watches as she holds up the edges of her skirt, keeping them hovering at her knees. He strolls in silence behind her, and her soft laughter coupled with the sea's rocking is the only sound to be heard for miles.

"I don't understand," Clu says finally, and she glances back at him over her shoulder, "why do you not retract the coding of your gown and dress into your suit?"

Ophelia snickers. "Why, that almost sounds naughty, Clu," she says. And he's still not entirely sure what her saying his name makes him feel. It's not disgust or anger, however. "It's more fun this way," she says and looks back at her feet. They're digging into the sand, toes wiggling. "I like how it feels."

"But it is impractical and messy."

"Exactly."

Ophelia kicks up a chunk of false sand. It's ridiculous, that's what it is. Yet there's a way about her clutching fistfuls of black fabric in her fingers as she holds up the long skirt, the way she lets the dirt cake her feet and ankles, the way she stamps about in the shallow water. It's childish, and it's almost...

"It's okay to let go."

Clu blinks and looks down. Ophelia is crouching before the water. It sweeps past and around her feet. Her skirt is loose, and it sways in the inches of cool liquid. She doesn't care, it seems, gliding smooth fingers along the surface.

"It's okay," she says again.

He doesn't understand her. Not entirely. Kevin has said the same many times, but it serves no purpose. No purpose can be served. Playing, "goofing" around decreased productivity; Kevin wanted this Grid to grow, correct? Of course, because that is what Clu wants. To build and mold this world into a utopia of perfection. So why throw yourself away to your whims, flights of fancies, when there is work to be done?

But Clu is standing there, watching the ISO drag fingers in the sand, draw pictures. The Grid moves and breathes and continues without him in the distance. He knows he is being hypocritical right now, but at the same time, there's a fascination in the figures she paints in the dirt. So he calls it "studying", and it doesn't seem entirely useless then.

\----

As the days pass, Ophelia surprises in ways that are unsurprising. She eats, drinks, laughs, frowns, contemplates, whispers, shouts; she does everything he does. And yet Clu knows she is not him, she is not the others. She is one of a kind, in ways not entirely literal. It brews something inside of him, the way she catches on fast. The way she understands, learns quick; the way she climbs to the same level as the Basics without being one of them. She blends in, but she does not... Not...

He's not sure.

Frustration builds, or something akin to it. And one day, Clu takes her out for a game. A simple round, discs only. He doesn't want to harm her, he tells himself, and if he did, Kevin would be livid. She agrees and they stand adjacent of one another in the arena, alone without the usual spectators. He equips his disc; she hers, and she handles it well for someone with no experience.

Ophelia catches on fast. She's no match for Clu; only Tron and Kevin can put up a fair fight with him. But she's got skills to hold the game, at least for a while. She's quick, moves with grace and agility; her strikes are just the same. Her disc and his collide multiple times, fly and cruise around and above one another. They each take their share of hits, but all of them superficial, all easy to repair. She's losing about ten minutes in, but Clu does not see the fierce drive of a warrior inside her, the instinct that they must win or die trying.

Maybe because Ophelia knows this is all play. Maybe because she is not of that way. But even as she is losing, slowly falling to defeat, she's laughing, she keeps going. She's not backing down. This is a game to her, pure and simple, and for some reason, this both infuriates and... amuses Clu. Would she laugh if she knew some of the opinions held of her? How some Basics wish her exile or demise because she was not one of them? How they held very good arguments as to why and how many points they made he also agreed on...?

Would she laugh as a disc was driven slowly through her throat?

"Hey!"

Clu wakes abruptly from the fog over his mind. He looks down, sees Ophelia on the ground; she's staring up at him, wide eyed. He notices his disc, the way it is held, how it is positioned; a fatal blow, one to kill. He clears his throat and steps back, disc now humming at his side. "Forgive me," he apologizes lowly.

"Where did you go?" Ophelia asks. The shock drains from her quickly. She stands, touches the wound on her arm. "It must have been some place dark and dangerous."

Clu ignores her question, examines the wounds on her body. Mostly cuts along her limbs, material derezzed across her belly. He approaches her, inquisitive. "Is the damage extensive?" he asks, regarding the wound she is fussing over.

Ophelia shakes her head. She removes her hand, and he sees the cream-white color of the circuits beneath her flesh in that sliver. And if he looked at the wound across his own arm, he'd see the same. The ISO watches, baffled, as he takes her arm without warning, gloved fingers carefully touching the edges of the tiny cut.

"It's nothing," she reassures.

But it's something. Ophelia can laugh and cry, frown and smile, and she can also be hurt. It's an amazing discovery for his mind veiled in something he can't quite recognize as sinister, not yet. Something that brings him the faint sense of hope, but... He looks her in the eyes, and she's staring at him, wondering.

Clu decides these wounds do not become her. He wants to know more, but he finds himself taking her disc and repairing the damage. The desire to study the breaks in her coding nearly overwhelms him, but he finishes and hands it back to her, and she takes it with a slow whisper of gratitude.

Clu wants to see what the _ISO_ can take, how much damage her body can handle, what to pull, what to bend, what to twist and claw apart until she breaks. But he doesn't want Ophelia to wear that pain.

\---

Soon, more come.

Like Ophelia, they rise from the sea, now in large numbers. They give themselves their own names. They have personality, they have knowledge. They are growing as the days turn into weeks. And Kevin's apprehension turns into fascination and bewilderment. Clu notices: this man has changed. He's not the User that breathed life into him; the birth of his son has inspired him, molded him into a whole new person.

Clu isn't sure he likes this man that started as a shadow but now swallowed his User whole. Just as much as he cannot share the joy and excitement at the alien race joining the ranks of his people.

"Why do you look so forlorn?"

Ophelia turns her gaze from the window. Below, the newborn ISOs are being cajoled into a group by Tron and Kevin, given the usual introductions and guidelines for living in the Grid. By this time, they've become mostly equal citizens, and the population is no longer surprised by their presence at nearly every street corner.

Clu walks up to her, hands behind his back. "Do I look forlorn?" she chuckles. Her smile is tired. "I'm not."

"You are not alone now."

"I know that."

"Then why?"

Ophelia brushes hair behind her ear. She does this when she's nervous, embarrassed, Clu has picked up long ago. "It's selfish of me," she murmurs, "I guess... For a while, I began to feel like that once in a lifetime miracle." Her smile twitches. "No longer the lost little girl who thought she was living in a dream, a princess of a foreign world."

She's right. It is selfish and egotistical of her to think she is special anymore. She is one of many now. And yet, Clu is not entirely in disagreement with her feelings. He's also not entirely quite sure why he's approaching her now, standing beside her. Ophelia looks to him, the sense of insignificance still in her eyes.

"You were the first."

It could be a compliment or just a fact being stated. Clu's more prone to the latter. But his words seem to be something above facts and flattery. It brings Ophelia to figurative tears. Clu's not sure why she looks so stunned, but she's edging closer to him, as if she wants to be nearer, more than physically. But she stays her distance and she laughs, something small and uneven.

They stand there for a while longer and watch the ISOs. They are both unsure of the future.

\----

Ophelia's cut her hair. Not much, just half an inch. But Clu is the first to notice; no one else does. It's nothing, really, no reason to tell anyone. A simple clipping. And yet when she greets Clu that morning, he sees that missing half-inch. He sees how it no longer hides half an inch of pale skin on her face, how it once reached the very edge of her smile. It's strange, ridiculous to even notice or ponder on, but he does and scolds himself for being distracted from work.

The ISOs are in the hundreds now. They've integrated themselves into society near perfectly. Some still consider them unwanted, unwelcome. He can't argue with them. Because even he feels there is something amiss with their existence.

Ophelia, she comes to him every time he is about to take a break. She doesn't want anything but conversation. He sits with her and he listens to her. She talks about many things. Clu finds he stops wishing his breaks ended sooner. Stops counting the minutes until it's back to work. Clu finds he doesn't mind it when she talks about anything and nothing. She lounges in her chair seated before his desk, or they chat while overlooking construction to the city below. Her words carry a weight he can't quite brush off, though sometimes he wants to simply because, like her, it's not natural to him and what he does not entirely understand, he does not entirely trust.

But he doesn't want to let it go, this odd feeling she brings when she stands just a few feet away from him, the feeling she evokes when she laughs, touches her hair, bites the corner of her lip, the quick glances that always jump back when he looks at her, the soft hitches of her chest that brighten the circuits on her suit, her questions about how he feels, how he's doing, how is work coming along, how are you today, Clu? Same old, same old, huh?

It's scary, but it's nice.

\----

Ophelia is socializing with her peers more. She's become quite a hit with the other ISOs. They consider her something of a leader, the original and thus should be revered. But she has no desire to be held on a pedestal. She wants friends, not followers. And the ISOs treat her as such, some because they wish to respect her wishes, but most because she is a sincerely good person.

She has a sense of humor that brings smiles to faces, wit, strength, and yet there's something frail to her. Clu knows all these things well. He has smiled at some of her jokes or comments, though half the time she has to point this out. She teases him because she knows he's not nearly as aloof and fun loving as his User, a man nearly identical to him. So when he does smile or chuckle, she snickers and points and he feels embarrassed and a little ashamed.

Clu knows her very well. And now others will as well. She's open about herself, willing to trust. He does not see her as often as he once did, when she was practically his ward. But he sees her sometimes, yes.

He watches her from the window of his office. On a break that lacks her warm company. She's sparring with a new friend, a handsome ISO named Jalen. It's all in good fun. He watches as they laugh and taunt one another, too silly to hold a real match. He watches as she reaches out and touches his elbow, her fingers, how they brush across his shoulder or tug at his bangs. He watches her act as she does with Clu and he doesn't know why, but he refuses to talk to Ophelia or even look at her for the next few days.

Ophelia notices quickly that something has come over the Programmer. She attempts to talk with him, but he turns her away or keeps himself busy. He's ignoring her, she knows that, but she wants to know why. Four days later, and Clu is still giving her the cold shoulder, but she is passing him down the hall as she speaks with Jalen and things change. And when their paths cross for just one moment, she catches the quick glare he gives the young male ISO and she stops, watches Clu go about his business as Jalen asks why she looks so surprised.

Tomorrow, Ophelia walks into Clu's office. She stands at his desk with his back to her, reading over a couple files. Her hands are fists at her sides. And she says it simply and only once.

"You were the first."

She leaves and Clu stops reading, stares at coding and numbers his mind cannot process.

The day after tomorrow, Ophelia goes to Clu's office, sits and talks about the new developments around the city. Clu sits across from her in his usual spot and listens.

\----

The ISO population continues to rapidly increase. Basics are nearly outnumbered. Tension starts to rise, and Clu is at the heart of it. Gridbug attacks are happening left and right now, especially in heavily ISO populated areas. They are nothing new to a system so young, but their numbers are becoming too extreme to be normal. Tron tells him he's being too paranoid, Kevin says he needs to relax - but Kevin's hardly around now. He comes once every few cycles, and he's become more hollowed out into something weak and pathetic.

The loss of his wife is a heavy toll on the User. It's torn him apart. And Clu is frustrated and angry. He doesn't understand. He doesn't think he ever will. He doesn't even want to.

Maybe something, he supposes. Maybe there's a strand of empathy he can share between himself and the User.

Ophelia comes to him one day, and she tells him about an attack on the city. She had nearly been derezzed alongside five others had Tron not showed up and exterminated the bug. And Clu, for a moment, he chokes on something inside, something akin to fear or terror.

Ophelia says she almost died. Clu isn't sure why it scares him. She's alive, she's okay. Yet he's afraid, still.

Ophelia's eyes soften as she smiles. "Would you miss me?" she asks.

Clu would. He touches her cheeks and his kiss is answer enough.

\----

Anatomically, Ophelia is like all the others. Even her skin and the circuits that map across it are the same. They're violet now, glowing bright in the dark room. She feels softer than he imagines. Clu lets his hands wander along each circuit over her naked body. He makes sure he has touched and examined each one. They're beautiful in their common designs and simplicity. She breaths and lifts her body flush against his, and it sends his circuits flickering. He holds her face in his hands, caresses the individual circuits beneath her fluttering, heavy eyes, and parted lips.

Ophelia holds onto him. She grinds circuits with circuits, touches the curved ones along his bare, arched back. She gives as much as she receives. Everything is sensitive; the curl around her thigh, the stripe below her left breast, the ring around her neck. Each light up beneath his touch; the more pressure, the louder her groans, the brighter the glow. But she's shaking in his embrace as he lays along her body, pushes her into the mattress, buries kisses in the crook of her shoulder and neck.

The ISO touches the back of his head, threads fingers in his hair and lightly pulls. He lifts his head, and her eyes study his. He feels like he's looking into a kaleidoscope, a world of colors he can't quite comprehend.

"Let me try," she whispers hoarsely and pulls him into a kiss. Messy, but gentle. It's her first - the first she's initiated and when it's done, she giggles and says they've more to thank the Users for besides writing and giving them form.

Sometime later - neither had been keeping up with time - when they laid in bed, Ophelia curled up against Clu, Clu would know this is how this story ended.

A new one could begin.

\----

They go through what is called the "honeymoon phase", Clu supposes. Nothing really changes, actually. They carry on like they always did. Held the same conversations, touched politely, appearing as the same good friends they've been for cycles. But behind closed doors, Ophelia is in his arms, holding him, kissing him, telling him to touch her, to kiss her, to hold her, and he asks the same, though it's in his actions and the ways he clings to her during their lovemaking. They acknowledge one another equally.

No one knows of their relationship. No one needed to.

\----

He's tired.

The Gridbugs are increasing, casualties are rising, the ISOs continue to flourish, Kevin is practically a ghost, and Basics are dwindling in numbers, and Clu is tired. He finds himself more frustrated lately, finds he can hardly stand to look at anyone some days. He locks himself in his office and argues with Tron and Shaddox because they want to continue the old ways, carry on as they have been for years. They find his ideas and suggestions outrageous, though he has yet to really pin an official name to what he calls the "abnormalities". It's on the tip of his tongue, so lethologica, but he cannot seem to speak it.

When Kevin visits, he provides Clu with nothing. Clu is tired of being angry with him, and now looks at him like a small thing. He's tired of trying to level with Kevin and the others, and he fears the respect he held for his Creator has become something of the past. And Kevin tries to convince him that his theories and ideas, they're all over the top and dangerous, but he does very little in a way of figuring out other ventures of action. It's the only one, it seems, but they don't want to get their hands dirty.

But at the end of every day, she is there. Ophelia sits with him on the edge of the bed, sometimes in silence. Usually most of the time. She places a hand in his. He sometimes responds, squeezes back. They don't do much, but she helps in a way. Her hand is delicate and soft and it feels good, fitting perfectly against his palm and fingers. He shuts his eyes and lays with her, and they will sleep and he never opens his eyes and looks at her, but he doesn't know why. He sees only her porcelain hand in his and it seems enough; to look into her eyes would kill him, but still the reason remains elusive.

Soon, Clu finds himself sitting with his back to her mostly. In the office, he is looking out the window or turned in his chair. Ophelia doesn't seem to mind, he supposes, he can't really be bothered to ask or try to find the disappointment or confusion in her tone. But she speaks with him, talks as she did before countless times, to his back but never to see his face anymore. Sometimes in their private room, they sit back to back but one thing remains constant: he holds out his hand and she takes it and so the emptiness melts away almost instantaneously.

\----

Ophelia stops asking if he's okay. She knows the answer. He doesn't talk nearly as much, avoids making eye contact with her. But his hand is still holding tight and needing.

\----

Clu comes to her a month later and says, "Kevin has given me full control of the Grid."

She looks at the back of his head. He's standing tall before the window. "That's good news," she says, "it's what you've been wanting for a while now." He doesn't speak. The ISO climbs to her feet and stands behind him. "Isn't it?" she asks.

Isn't it? "It is." Right?

He doesn't know how to tell her this control might be the end of everything. Her fingers curl over his shoulder and one cheek is against his back. He stares on into emptiness as she says quietly, "I'm happy for you."

\----

He decides what must be done when he's laying beside Ophelia, staring at the length of her naked back, circuits soft as she slumbered. He decides what must be done, and he touches the half an inch of her hair that grew back, maybe because she programmed it to or it was due to her mysterious ISO powers.

He decides she's the first, she's the miracle, and so she'll be spared.

\----

The cards are spread and the game begins. The first ISOs to die come as a shock. Clu pretends to be equally horrified. It's murder, plain and simple. Ten ISOs, ten innocent ISOs, there was personal vendetta behind the attack. Clu persuades the others it was nothing of the sort. He goes to his room after a long day dealing with the panicked, shocked crowds and finds Ophelia sitting on the edge of the bed.

Her face is tucked in her hands. She could be crying, she might have the ability to shed tears. He's never seen her cry. The idea both intrigues and frightens him. His hand clutches at his side and he leaves without a word.

\----

Tension rises, and Ophelia agrees to become the leader the ISOs cry for. The stake driven between her and Clu only drives deeper, but they do not let go.

\----

The distance is growing. They stop speaking all together, but they never stop visiting. The silence is enough. They have nothing to say. She lays in his arms some nights and the energy is gone. But she's not to blame. She is grieving, and Clu is lost. Lost somewhere in a state of deadly confusion. He refuses to acknowledge it, keeps his mind set on his plans.

It's one night that makes him realize why he cannot look at her face, can hardly speak with her these days. A surprise, she's suddenly in front of him in his office; he's not on break, busy with his work, but she is there. She is dressed in the extravagant robes of the ISO leader, angelic and omnipotent in appearance. But there is sadness in her eyes that are all too mortal.

Ophelia slides her hands on his cheeks and forces him to meet her gaze after nearly a month of having not seen the dark coal black. They're the same hue as he remembers, beautiful and yet...

"Where are you?"

Clu blinks then shakes his head. "I've no time for this."

"What's happened to you?" She keeps her hands on his cheeks, holding his head in place. Making sure he cannot escape her eyes, so intense and curious and a little frightened. She's trying to look inside him, deep inside, past the walls he has built, some of which are to keep her safe. "What's _happening_ to you?"

Clu realizes why he cannot look at her face, can hardly speak with her these days. He takes one of her hands, something that doesn't fit anymore, and forces it off. "Excuse me," he says and buries himself back in work. Ophelia does not leave for another five minutes, goes as silent as she came.

It's because he sees what she is, and what she is he despises.

\----

In the darkness, he cannot see her face. The blanket covers the circuits across her body. He presses his lips to her forehead and whispers, "When did you stop being Ophelia?"

She hears him, but continues pretending otherwise.

\----

_Where did you go? It must have been some place dark and dangerous._

He'd never thought he'd take her there, but the inevitable is still the inevitable.

She's looking at him, so many emotions there isn't one he can define more potent over the other.

She knows. She knows everything.

She's standing ten feet away from him. Her circuits are pallor white, and his a sickly yellow.

She's in a whole new world now. He cannot reach her. He's afraid what he'll do if he does. And he knows how she would respond.

Ophelia keeps the disc in her hand and runs at the command of her bodyguards. Clu doesn't chase her, and orders his men to stay put as well.

\----

Clu wants to thank Ophelia. Tell her she's the reason he read the story. Instead, he says, "It ended in countless tragedies. Depressing, really."

Ophelia glares. Time and the world has hardened her. She looks the same on the outside, but he sees in her someone entirely new. A whole different woman standing before him on the shores of the polluted water, disc in hand, ready to tear him to pieces.

Perhaps that is good. Because if this was Ophelia, he wouldn't be here. And because it is her, he is here.

"It's too late," she says, her voice strained, "there's no going back."

Clu cannot be redeemed. He knows that.

"It doesn't have to end this way." He smiles faintly. "I still... Do not wish to harm you."

Ophelia grins bitterly. "I see," she chuckles. She knows the reason for his hesitation, knows the word he wants to say but cannot.

And it hurts because she still loves him, too.

"As long as I am an ISO," she replies, "I cannot live in your 'perfect' system."

Clu stares. "You are not an ISO. You are Ophelia."

She laughs, loudly. She drops her face in her hand and the cackles fade into something soft and bitter. God, has it really come to this? What God? Kevin was dead. Killed by his very own creation. She lifts her head slowly. "That is how you managed to tolerate my existence for all those cycles," she whispers. She brushes a lock of hair behind he ear and Clu grimaces. "In a way, it's almost romantic..."

"Surrender yourself, Ophelia," Clu orders, "and I will spare your life."

"You can't promise that," she spits, "you know in the end you'll want me dead." She nods to him. "It's why you came. You want to finish this."

"Not like this."

"You manage to remain sentimental even after you've been swallowed whole by that dark and dangerous place," Ophelia says. She squeezes her disc. "I cannot allow this to continue. This world - it's become so big, and yet, only one of us can survive in it." She raises her head, meets Clu's gaze. Sullen, pained, burning. "It's tragic."

There's no mocking in her tone. She's sincerely wounded. And Clu feels he may be too. But then she's running at him, screaming, disc raised. He hesitates, not quite prepared though this is why he came, this is why he accepted her invite. She nearly slices his arm, but misses; Clu equips his disc and the battle begins.

It's not like before. Their sparring had all been in good fun, playing around. There's heat behind this, pure, murderous heat. Ophelia is no longer that little girl who laughed as she was slowly dragged to her defeat, laughed because this meant nothing, there was no harm. She'd be okay, they'd be okay. But now she's something else, something menacing and troubling and Clu finds she's become more powerful and stronger in the cycles of their separation, playing a new game of cat and mouse, fox and hare, down to cobra and mongoose. Clu almost feels like laughing remembering these phrases and comparisons Kevin used all the time.

They fight, fast, furious. She's covered in cuts and wounds, but she's not faltering. Clu feels pain streak across his body when she manages to hit. And he knows in the back of his mind he could have taken her out long ago, but for some reason, his blows soften, slow when he knows they may be fatal. She, on the other hand, puts her full strength into her attacks - she is not holding back, she is not remembering.

And that is enough. It's enough to ignite that quiet fire inside him. The same flame used to blow and burn his enemies out, churn them into dust. Ophelia was dead and gone, left a poor mocking image of the woman he loved. This Ophelia knew nothing of their nights together, the way they held and loved, touched and kissed each other. The nights where she told him how he was her first, always would be, the days where they conversed in the light of a city slowly growing before their very eyes.

This Ophelia knew nothing of the smiles they exchanged, the fleeting touches, the laughter, the goodhearted ribbing, the gasps and writhes and cries and hushed, shaky "I love you"'s.

She's not Ophelia, this thing fighting him, just another disgusting ISO.

Clu knocks the disc from her hand. Ophelia gasps, goes to punch before hands are gripped around her throat. He shoves her forward, their feet scuffling in the water and she hisses in pain. The fresh virus in the water is eating at her coding and she struggles to release herself, pulls at his hands. But Clu is determined to destroy this doppelganger, to punish it for having taken Ophelia's face.

Ophelia continues writhing. His hands grip tighter around her long, pale throat until circuits are flashing and she's choking, barely able to muster a breath of air. It's almost ironic; she was the first to be born, and the last to die. It won't kill her, not this, her fingers tearing into his hands; it's only pain she feels, but nothing fatal. Clu shoves her into the water; they're knee deep now, and he holds her under by the neck.

And she stops.

She's alive. He knows this much. But she's not fighting. He watches her face beneath the contaminated water. He's shaking, locks of hair loose and hanging over his wild eyes. He feels sick and enraged and depressed. But Clu cannot look away from her eyes as her hands release his and fall to her sides. Accepting, almost, accepting her inevitable fate. Her body is slowly derezzing, fading away into pixels of white beneath the rocking water.

Clu cannot stop looking. Even as she is clearly gone, half of her body derezzed, he cannot stop looking into her glassy eyes.

He's drowning in them, drowning the longer he looks and he almost wants to laugh. Drowning in her eyes? How ridiculously fitting! He laughs and his hands are still around her throat, though she is barely nothing now.

Clu keeps drowning in those eyes until there's nothing left, save this madness when he finally claws back to the surface.

**Author's Note:**

> The title is inspired from Paramore's song of the same name. For more information on Ophelia, check out her [Tron wikia page](http://tron.wikia.com/wiki/Ophelia).


End file.
